#Indeed the story that Margaret and her sisters Euphemia and Sybilla were poisoned | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

the-busy-ghost · 3 years

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Thinking about how the Drummonds are one of only three families (the other two being the powerful royal houses of Plantagenet and Oldenburg) who produced at least two Scottish queen consorts, and they weren’t even in the highest rank of the nobility at the time.

#Says a lot about the first Margaret Drummond's pull I think #Though Annabella was no mean prospect either #Admittedly it was a time when Scottish kings sought brides in their own country anyway #But I do think it's interesting to later skip ahead a century or so to James IV's time #Since his mistresses were almost as closely related to him as his queen later was #And indeed one of them was Margaret Tudor' cousin too (Agnes Stewart)#But that was because of Joan Beaufort and not the Drummonds #Though the second Margaret Drummond (the mistress not the queen) was not the only member of her family whose relationships #were important in an aristocratic setting #Her sister Beatrix seems to have been mistress to the Earl of Arran at about the same time and bore children #(but don't get me started on that because illegitimacy and the Scottish aristocracy and the expectations of the father are a pet rant)#Elizabeth married the Master of Angus so she was mother of Margaret Tudor's second husband #Euphemia married Lord Fleming #Indeed the story that Margaret and her sisters Euphemia and Sybilla were poisoned #doesn't seem to have originated in Margaret's relationship with King James IV but with her sister Euphemia's marriaged to John Lord Fleming #One of the eariest references to a suspicion that the sister were poisoned is in a letter from Margaret Tudor #around twenty years later where she claims that Fleming wasn't to be trusted around her son because he had poisoned his own wife #But anyway enough of that rant #They're a fascinating family #And they were still only lords of parliament in James IV's time #They are one of several families who give a really interesting insight into aristocratic connections #But out of all Scottish families only they produced two queens (and a royal mistress) and they rank with only two European families

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